AMC - or what became of Hudson, Ramble & Nash ?

A few different prompts brought me to the idea of researching the history of AMC a bit further. James posted a photo of an AMC Pacer seen in Paris and this started me digging back to when a friend of mine had a Pacer in London. Pete was a professional musician who lived in Maida Vale and had a taste for unusual cars. I was a mechanic trying to get some tips on being a guitar hero. We both fell short, but at least had a laugh along the way.

A long time before that, another friend Dave, who also had a liking for American cars asked me to come along to check out a station wagon in south London. It was an AMC Ambassador in olive green with fake wood trim along the sides, but surprising to me, (already well versed in the legendary T-Birds, Mustangs, Camaros etc), it was a damn fine car. In excellent condition, smooth quiet and comfortable wit ha decent 360CI V8, it ticked all the boxes for Dave. We took it for a test drive, and along the way, he had to try all the gadgets, even including a mysterious switch on the dash that said 'Desert Only'. This was a cold, damp winter night on the Old Kent Road, and desert only must have referred to some super cool air-conditioning gizmo as the windscreen immediately froze over.

Scary.

Quick.... park.... heater on... and get scraping.

Once we had vision again and drove back to Brent Cross I doubt Dave ever used that switch again. Anyway, that was a fine car, we had lots of fun, great trips, the whole gang.

So, that got me digging, and from my collection of old car brochures, I scanned a few related ones from years gone by. Strange how people will spend silly money on a few Hemi Cudas, BOSS Mustangs or COPO Camaros and Yenko Chevelles when they could have a varied colection of American classics for a fraction of the cost.

From the late forties 'Step-Down' Hudsons, through the fifties 'Airflite' Nashes to the mergers with Rambler and Nash, and then with Hudson there were many cars with unique character. And let's not forget the Nash Metropolitan - marketed as an Austin in the UK - although by the sixties all that was left was the Rambler badge. Not until the rejuvenated AMC made an impact with the Javelin did the group have a potential classic, but those weird and wacky seventies models deserve some recognition if only for going against the trends of the time.

I know these are not Ferraris or 'Blower' Bentleys, but for a bit of history of the cars on the margins of history they deserve some cool points.

By the way, apologies for the spelling at the top, that should be Hudson Rambler and Nash, but as my eyesight is not what it was, and once posted, a new thread can not be edited, my best excuse for a typo is that the post started by James Elliott three weeks ago was titled 'When did you last seen one of these?' and he was the editor himself, gawd bless 'im.